Happy Memorial Day, nuts. After 14 years, multiple busted trilogies, and one Acolyte whoopsie, Star Wars finally returned to the big screen for the first time since The Rise of Skywalker in 2019. And the verdict? Well, let's get into it...

The Mandalorian and Grogu opened to roughly $82 million over the three-day weekend and is tracking toward a $91-94 million four-day Memorial Day haul, with international adding about another $69M for a global debut in the ballpark of $160M. That's not a bad number on paper. It's just not what you want to read about the first theatrical Star Wars in seven years.

For reference, Solo: A Star Wars Story, the previous "uh oh" Star Wars movie, opened to $84.4M three-day and $103M four-day back in 2018. So Jon Favreau's Mando outing has officially comped to the least successful Star Wars movie of the Disney era. The audience CinemaScore landed at A- (matching Solo, by the way), Disney+ subscribers showed up in force, IMAX and PLF screens did 48% of the business, and the under-12 crowd flagged it as a 95% positive must-see. So the people who wanted Star Wars to be Star Wars again got what they came for. The casual moviegoer who burned out somewhere around a purple-haired admiral driving a star cruiser through a fleet at lightspeed? Apparently still on vacation.

All in all, the consensus is that the movie is essentially just another episode of the tv series… except its two hours long. No real stakes, no advancement or world building, no tie in to the larger franchise. In other words, it’s a pretty boring and extended version of what we’ve all already seen on Disney+ about a dozen times. Now, to be fair this is still a movie that was produced from the Kathleen Kennedy era. She was only just removed off her throne in January. That being said, this was a Filoni project, who has now taken the wheel as President and Chief Creative Officer of Lucasfilm and if this is what he’s planning to deliver more of, I’m not sure there’s any hope left for this franchise.

In the actual feel-good story of the weekend, Focus Features and Blumhouse's micro-budget horror-romance Obsession did the unthinkable: it went UP in week two by 16% on the three-day. That is, to use a technical term, bonkers. Wide-release movies don't do that. Horror movies especially don't do that. Obsession is now at a near $55 million domestic 11-day cume on a budget that was reportedly under $15M, and is tracking ahead of Longlegs and just behind Nosferatuas, Focus Features' highest grossing horror title ever.

Curry Barker, the guy who made this thing after uploading a short film to YouTube, just put in one of the best filmmaker debut weekends of 2026. Definite recommend is up to 74% from 70% last week. Women under 25 are giving it a 91% positive grade. It's the kind of mid-budget, original, character-driven horror that the doom-and-gloom crowd insists Hollywood can't make anymore. Turns out you can - you just have to actually try. Take notes, every studio with a $250M legacy sequel on the runway.

Lionsgate's Michael is doing what Michael does - holding like a champ. The Antoine Fuqua-directed Michael Jackson biopic added another $18.5 million in its fifth frame, dropping just 29%. Domestic cume hits $317.8 million by EOD Monday, with worldwide closing in on $800 million. At this rate it's going to crawl past Oppenheimer's $330M domestic and become the second-highest-grossing music biopic ever behind Bohemian Rhapsody.

The Devil Wears Prada 2 hung around for fourth in week four with $11.3M and a domestic total now at $198 million - inches from the $200M club. Sheep Detectives, the Hugh Jackman comedy from Amazon MGM, took fifth with $8 million in its third frame ($45.5M cume). Down at the bottom of the top ten, Project Hail Mary is still chugging along at $339.9M domestic and an Amazon MGM-record $613M worldwide.

Over at the Croisette, Cristian Mungiu picked up his second Palme d'Or for Fjord, the Sebastian Stan and Renate Reinsve drama about a Romanian Evangelical family caught up in a Norwegian child abuse case. That makes Neon seven straight years distributing the Palme winner, which is just an absolutely absurd run for any indie distributor. Whatever you think of festival fare, that's a hot streak.

Meanwhile, Florence Pugh's Garth Davis-directed The Midnight Library (based on the Matt Haig bestseller) is reportedly the biggest deal happening at the Cannes market, with multiple studios chasing distribution. The $70M-budget fantasy drama is non-IP, non-sequel, and entirely dependent on a movie star opening it. Remember those? Yeah, us neither.

A loaded summer ahead. Bring Her Back (the Philippou brothers' A24 nightmare follow-up to Talk to Me) slides into theaters this Friday, May 30. Disclosure Day with Emily Blunt and Josh O'Connor (Spielberg's first UFO movie since Close Encounters) lands June 12. Toy Story 5 hits June 19. Then Supergirl with Milly Alcock on June 26, and Avengers: Doomsday still circled for December 18.

Cinelytic is still projecting $4.5 billion domestic for summer, which would be the biggest haul since 2016. After this Memorial Day frame coming in at $209M (down 37% from last year's Lilo & Stitch-fueled record), the industry needs the back half of summer to step up. Disclosure Day, Toy Story 5, and whatever Pixar throws at us this fall are going to have to do some serious work.

We share all the best news and memes as they happen on social media, so be sure to follow us on YouTube, X, Instagram, and TikTok!